Nairobi, Kenya – Nine thousand miles from his home in Denver, FBI Special Agent Carle Schlaff faced 60 top African detectives packed into a room here as part of a new U.S. focus on Africa.
Schlaff’s mission: to work with these African counterparts on forensics and cultivate them as security partners.
The U.S. government views Africa with renewed interest as a frontier for terrorism where al-Qaeda and other Islamic radicals hide. Africa also supplies a growing share of the oil Americans consume – nearly a fifth.
Terrorists here could affect U.S. interests and organize attacks inside the United States, said William Bellamy, U.S. ambassador to Kenya.
“We try to monitor as best we can” airport travelers to prevent terrorists from entering America, he said. “But I would not exclude the possibility that could occur. … It’s certainly possible.”
Kenyan police recently found antitank missiles – some U.S.- made – in a terrorism suspect’s apartment at Mombasa, Kenya.
The U.S. priority in Africa of combating global terrorism has led President Bush to deploy military forces at a growing network of bases from Algeria to Uganda – in a pattern Bush set after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
About 1,600 U.S. soldiers, airmen, Marines and sailors are posted in Djibouti at a base called Camp Lemonier, a former French Foreign Legion outpost. It is the first large long-term deployment of U.S. forces to Africa.
Bush also sent special forces soldiers to Mali, Chad and Niger for exercises with local forces against radical Muslims.
And U.S. officials have delivered more than $152 million in weapons to sub-Saharan Africa since 2001, up from $92 million during the previous four years.
But the military approach stokes resentment. African leaders say they’re more interested in fighting worsening poverty than serving U.S. interests.
African authorities believe young men here were willing to join anti-U.S. groups “because they had no jobs,” said Nicholas Kamwende, commander of the Kenyan National Police anti- terrorism unit.
“We think fighting poverty is one of our ways of fighting terrorism,” he said.
Kamwende said the United States traditionally has used skillful diplomacy and developmental aid to help Africa address water, health care and economic needs.
Tensions are mounting. Kenyan courts recently acquitted several terrorism suspects indicted in the United States, and Kenyan lawmakers have refused to pass an anti-terrorism law.
U.S. State Department officials say savvy cops such as Schlaff, who also has worked in Botswana and the Red Sea area, can be more effective than soldiers in helping locals root out terrorists.
Here in a spartan conference hall, Schlaff wore a sport shirt and slacks instead of the camouflage fatigues that mark most U.S. warriors.
He smiled the way he might over coffee back home as the African detectives in coats and ties stood quiet. He handed out FBI pins, patches, fingerprint kits and cameras. He showed photos of his family in the Colorado mountains.
He told of his forensics work on the FBI team that investigated the bombing of the USS Cole warship that killed 17 sailors. Schlaff helped dredge the harbor off Yemen and found part of an outboard motor that cracked the case.
The attentiveness of Kenyan police officers impressed him, Schlaff said.
“Their focus is street crime. We’re not suggesting a different focus. We’re just trying to make them aware there could be a terrorism matter involved.”
Now, Schlaff is back in the United States. But detectives he coached are working in Eastleigh, a Somali-run ghetto on the outskirts of Nairobi, trying to recruit sources, offering money for tips.
They’ve discovered funds flowing from Somalia to Eastleigh for construction of shopping malls. They’re investigating who might be sinking roots or raising money here in Kenya.
These efforts bore out Schlaff’s conclusions. Street- level police when treated with respect “are genuinely interested in working with us” against terrorism, he said.
“If you want to convince people Americans are not the aggressor, I think you’ve got to do it by being there low on the ground.”
